


Now That I Saw You (I Can Never Look Away)

by secretsidgenowriter



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Developing Relationship, Established Relationship, First Kiss, First Time, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Retirement, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-18
Updated: 2020-05-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 21:34:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24253675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/secretsidgenowriter/pseuds/secretsidgenowriter
Summary: “Everyone always wants something,” he had said once and Zhenya hadn’t known what he meant. He thought Sid was paranoid. He thought he was blocking his own shot. He thought he was a little crazy.
Relationships: Sidney Crosby/Evgeni Malkin
Comments: 14
Kudos: 217





	Now That I Saw You (I Can Never Look Away)

**Author's Note:**

> But SSGW, aren't you supposed to be working on one of your many WIPs? Yeah, yeah I am.

“Are you done?”

Zhenya looks up at Sid standing on the other side of the table, empty plate in one hand while the other is outstretched, teaching toward Zhenya’s.

“Yes,” Zhenya says as he picks the plate up so Sid can grab it. There’s only one bite of omelette left and Sid grabs it with his fingers and pops it into his mouth, a piece of diced onion slipping out and hitting the table, before he takes both plates over to the sink.

“I’m going to the store this morning,” Sid says as he rinses there plates, “do you want to come…..Geno?”

“Ah.” Zhenya shakes his head. “No, don’t think.”

“Okay. What do you want for dinner, I’ll pick something up.”

“Umm..” Zhenya shrugs then realizes Sid can’t see him with his back turned. “Fish.”

“We had fish last night.”

Zhenya suppresses a sigh. It’s too early for so many questions. “Burgers,” he decides, “can use grill.”

“Beef or turkey?”

“Umm. Beef.”

“Regular fries or sweet potato?”

“....sweet.”

“Okay. I’ll see what vegetables they have. Maybe some corn.”

Sid sets the plates in the drying rack and raises his arms above his head in a long stretch. Zhenya watches him ease up onto his top toes, the muscles in his calves flexing before he drops down and turns.

“I’m gonna take a shower before I go,” he says, scratching a hand across his stomach as he steps toward Zhenya. He pets a hand through Zhenya’s hair. “Do you wanna join me?”

Zhenya sets his phone down and pushes his chair back. He doesn’t need to think twice about that.

When Zhenya thought about his life after the NHL he thought about Russia. He thought about the KHL and Moscow and Magnitogorsk and seeing his parents every weekend. He thought about coaching, maybe, and marriage, definitely. A wife and kids and a big house and vacationing somewhere with bright blue water and white sand beaches.

He never thought about Canada and a small town and a charming lakeside cottage. About a hockey camp and farmers markets and Sidney Crosby down on his knees in the shower, taking him a part like it was the only thing he was ever made to do.

He’s been thrown a few curveballs in his life but that last one has to be the most dramatic.

When they first started fucking, Zhenya thought that’s all it was ever going to be.

They were so young and the fame was so fresh and Sidney didn’t trust anyone he didn’t know before it all hit.

“Everyone always wants something,” he had said once and Zhenya hadn’t known what he meant. He thought Sid was paranoid. He thought he was blocking his own shot. He thought he was a little crazy.

He thought and he thought and he thought until Sid kissed him one night after a game down a quiet corridor in the Igloo and then he didn’t think about anything. Dry, chapped lips against dry, chapped lips. Hard and quick and certain.

Sid had leaned back and lifted his chin. He looked Zhenya right in the eye and squared his shoulders, readying himself for whatever was thrown at him, verbally or physically.

Zhenya said nothing, just put his hand on the back of Sid’s neck and pulled him back for a real kiss, with teeth and tongue that left them both breathless.

“Come home with me,” Sid had said and Zhenya had laughed.

“To Mario’s?”

“I have a private entrance,” Sid snapped which only made Zhenya laugh harder. Sid poked him hard in the shoulder. “You live with Gonch, you’re not any better.”

Still laughing, Zhenya pulled him into another kiss.

Sid’s place at Mario’s was private but they still muffled moans into each other’s skin and rocked together slowly so the headboard didn’t knock into the wall.

After they laid side by side, letting the sweat cool on their bodies. Sid had pointed his toes and stretched his legs and let his hand flop against Zhenya’s chest.

“I’ve never done that before,” he said quietly and before Zhenya could ask what he meant he added “with anyone.”

Zhenya stared wide eyed up at the ceiling and replayed it over in his head, worrying that it wasn’t good enough, that he moved too fast and gripped too tight.

“Guys in juniors would try to set me up with girls but I just….” He trailed off and drew his bottom lip in between his teeth. “They all said I was too nice and too polite. Some of them called me gay. Some of them called me a--.” He stopped and shook his head. “I’m glad I waited. I’m glad it was with you. I don’t really care what they think that makes me.”

Zhenya had turned his head and kissed the curve of Sid’s shoulder and Sid swung his leg over Zhenya’s hips and pushed himself up.

“Do you wanna do it again,” he asked and Zhenya grabbed him by the hips and flipped him back over.

They were together as much as they could be. In private. In quiet moments. Not in front of the team or their families or reporters.

It went on for years like that.

They didn’t touch in public. They didn’t look too long or stand too close.

Nothing changed out on the ice or the locker room or on the team plane as they criss-crossed the country.

Sid sat with Flower and Zhenya sat in the back, holding court with lively poker games.

They went out to bars and Zhenya flirted and Sid pretended not to watch and not to care, heading back to the hotel early to get some sleep.

Back in Pittsburgh in the safety of Sid’s small apartment Sid asked if he was fucking other people.

“Of course not.”

“You just act like you are.”

“How else, Sid? How else do I act?”

Sid had shrugged and apologized. “I know it’s not easy and it’s not fair but I don’t like seeing it. At least over the summer I don’t have to see it.”

“No one over the summer, Sid.”

“I don’t know if I believe that, I’m sorry.”

It stung and Zhenya couldn’t even try to hide it. “You with anyone else?”

Sid shook his head. “No. There’s no one.”

Zhenya believed that even though he always braced himself when September rolled around. A little part of him was always sure Sid was going to come back to Pittsburgh with some pretty Canadian woman on his arm. They were in love and they were going to get engaged because that’s what was supposed to happen and who was Sidney Crosby to ever rock the boat.

“I trust you,” Zhenya told him, “wish you trusted me.”

He found Sid later, leaning against his car in the Consol parking lot. It was dark and nearly empty, most of the guys having already left for home, but they could hear the noise of the fans on the streets around them.

“I do trust you,” Sid told him. “I just keep waiting for something to go wrong. This is too good. Something has to go wrong, you know?”

Zhenya didn’t know because it didn’t have to but he pulled Sid in for a hug and let Sid hold him until it started to snow and the world went quiet.

Nothing went wrong.

Through years and seasons and summers, nothing went wrong between them.

They made it through disappointing playoff series and injuries and trades.

Sid moved out of Mario’s, finally, into a house that he helped design himself.

“I made sure the bathtub was big enough for the both of us. The shower too.”

Sid never asked him to move in but it was implied. Geno had his own place but he hardly ever saw it. He parked his car in the garage beside Sid’s and hung his coat in the hallway beside Sid’s and ate breakfast, lunch, and dinner beside Sid.

Sid leaned into him in public. Brushed their hands together as they walked. Kissed him in dark bars and invited him on trips to Europe during the summer.

It was good and they were happy until one night at dinner where Sid spent more time staring off into middle distance than eating.

Zhenya nudged his foot against Sid’s shin to get his attention. “What’s wrong? Acting weird.”

“Mario is upset.”

Zhenya frowned. They were in a playoff spot with less than a month to go. “About what?”

Sid sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. “Tanger has a kid and Flower is getting married and we’re…”

Zhenya’s body went ice cold before flashing white hot.

“He said he’s worried how it’ll look if it gets out. We’re….we make an awful lot of money for the team. He said he could find someone for me, just until I retire, to make it look good. He could find someone for you too.”

“What you say?”

“I told him to go to hell.”

Zhenya’s hand immediately shot out to grip at Sid’s.

“Everyone wants something,” Sid said and for the first time Zhenya understood what he meant. “You’re the only one that just wants me. I’m tired of pretending you’re just my teammate. You’ve never been _just_ anything.”

They retired together, to the horror of the fans and the press.

“You could still play,” Sid had told him, “for a few more years, at least. The new kids are good and with a little work and a lot of luck you could win again. Maybe.”

“Not without you,” Zhenya said. “Am not playing without you. Was never the plan.”

“But--.”

Zhenya cut him off with a kiss. It was a lot for the team to lose. A lot for the city to lose. A lot for the league to lose but he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t step onto the ice with someone new in front of him.

“Come home with me,” Sid asked him, “for good.”

Zhenya could only ever say yes.

Looking back, everything was always leading here. Where else would they go? What else would they do?

He watches Sid move around the room, their room, naked and still damp from the shower, stopping in front of the chest of drawers to pull out a pair of basketball shorts and a t-shirt.

Their new uniform since their old one were pulled up to the rafters at PPG.

“What are you going to do today,” Sid asks as he pulls a shirt over his head.

Zhenya flops back against the bed, their bed, and stretches his arms above his head, arching his back until he hears it pop.

When he looks back to Sid, Sid’s watching him with dark, interested eyes.

“Maybe nothing, maybe just stay here all day.”

“I have to go to the store,” Sid says as he steps into a pair of shorts. “We need food.”

“So you just leave me here like this?”

Sid squeezes Zhenya’s toe and Zhenya sits up.

“You could come with me.”

Zhenya likes going to the store with Sid. He likes doing almost everything with Sid. They’re open about who they are up here and if people stare, they don’t let it bother them.

“Or,” Sid says, “you could take a nap or take a walk or take the boat out. You could fish or read a book or--.”

“Ugh, boring, Sid.”

Sid laughs. “Welcome to retirement.” He kisses Zhenya’s forehead and ruffles his hair. “I’ll see you when I get back.”

Maybe that’s it.

Retirement. No more training camp, no more road trips, no more cups. He’s having a hard time believing that this is it. That the weather will turn and the leaves will change and they’ll still be _here._ They’ll watch the lake ice over and the season start from their couch down in the den and they won’t be _there._

It was always going to happen. It was inevitable and it’s an easy trade off for this life he gets to live with Sid.

He’ll spend today fishing and tomorrow they’ll take the boat out and the day after that he’ll nap or read a book or watch TV.

He’ll do all of it with Sid. He’ll hold his hand and kiss his cheek and forehead and lips and he’ll tell him that he loves him--.

“I love you,” Zhenya says and Sid tips his head to the side before ducking down and pressing their lips together.

Hard and quick and certain.

“I love you, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Maybe Daylight by Taylor Swift is the Sid/Geno song we all need and deserve.


End file.
